Detailed Biography

Viggo Peter Mortensen, Jr. is an American actor, poet, musician, photographer and painter.

His film roles include Aragorn in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, Frank T. Hopkins in Hidalgo, Tom Stall in David Cronenberg's A History of Violence, and his Academy and Golden Globe Award-nominated role as Nikolai Luzhin in Cronenberg's Eastern Promises. He also stars in the film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's novel The Road as "The Man".

Early life

Mortensen was born in New York City. His American mother, Grace Gamble , and Danish father, Viggo Peter Mortensen, Sr., met in Norway. His maternal grandfather was from Nova Scotia, Canada. His family moved to Venezuela, Denmark, and Argentinian cities Córdoba and Buenos Aires, where he learned Spanish. His father managed chicken farms and ranches in Argentina. They remained there until Mortensen was eleven, when his parents divorced and his mother moved back to New York. He moved with his father to Copenhagen, Denmark. Mortensen and his father eventually went back to the United States, where he graduated from Watertown High School in Watertown, New York. After high school, he returned to Denmark and became a truck driver in Esbjerg, Denmark, before again returning to the United States to pursue an acting career. He attended St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York, earning a bachelor's degree in Spanish. He chose that subject because he could get good grades without a lot of study, leaving him free to be in a lot of plays. At his commencement, he refused to wear an academic gown because they were made by sweatshop workers. However, after the Lord of the Rings trilogy, when he was granted an honorary doctorate by his alma mater, he did appear in the appropriate robes.

Acting career

After several years of experience in live theater, Mortensen made his first film appearance playing an Amish farmer in Peter Weir's Witness. Also in 1985, he was cast in the role of Bragg on Search for Tomorrow. Mortensen's 1987 performance in Bent at the Coast Playhouse, Los Angeles, won him a Dramalogue Critics' Award. Coincidentally, the play, about homosexual concentration camp prisoners, was originally brought to prominence by Ian McKellen, with whom Mortensen later costarred in The Lord of the Rings.

During the 1990s, Mortensen appeared in supporting roles in a variety of films, including Jane Campion's The Portrait of a Lady, Young Guns II, Prison, Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III, Sean Penn's The Indian Runner, Carlito's Way, Crimson Tide, G.I. Jane, Daylight, A Walk on the Moon, American Yakuza, Charles Robert Carner's remake Vanishing Point, Philip Ridley's two films The Reflecting Skin and The Passion of Darkly Noon, A Perfect Murder and Gus Van Sant's Psycho , 28 Days, and The Prophecy, with Christopher Walken. Of these roles, Mortensen was probably best-known for playing Master Chief John Urgayle in G.I. Jane. Mortensen at the premiere of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, December 1, 2003.

Mortensen's major mainstream breakthrough came in 1999 with his being cast as Aragorn in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings film trilogy. According to the Special Extended Edition DVD of Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Mortensen was a last-minute replacement for Stuart Townsend, and wouldn't have taken the part of Aragorn had it not been for his son's enthusiasm for the J. R. R. Tolkien novel. In the Two Towers DVD extras, the film's swordmaster, Bob Anderson, described Mortensen as "the best swordsman I've ever trained." Mortensen performed all of his own stunts, insisting it would look more authentic, and even the injuries he sustained on several of them did not dampen his enthusiasm. At one point during shooting of Two Towers, Orlando Bloom, John Rhys-Davies' stunt double, and Mortensen all had fairly serious injuries, and during a shoot of them, running in the mountains, Peter Jackson jokingly referred to the three as "the walking wounded."

In 2004, Mortensen starred as Frank Hopkins in Hidalgo, the story of an ex-army courier who travels to Arabia to compete with his horse, Hidalgo, in a dangerous race for a massive contest prize.

In 2005, Mortensen starred in David Cronenberg's A History of Violence. He was nominated for a Satellite Award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture for this role. In the DVD extras for A History of Violence, David Cronenberg relates that Mortensen is the only actor he'd come across who would come back from weekends with his family with items he had bought to use as props on the set. Interviewed by eTalk Daily at the 2005 Toronto Film Festival, for A History of Violence

In 2006, he starred as Captain Diego Alatriste in Alatriste, based on the series of novels The Adventures of Captain Alatriste, written by the Spanish writer Arturo Pérez-Reverte.

In September 2007, the film Eastern Promises, directed by David Cronenberg, was released to critical acclaim for the film itself and for Mortensen's performance as a Russian gangster on the rise in London. His nude fight scene in a steam room was applauded by Roger Ebert: "Years from now, it will be referred to as a benchmark." Mortensen's performance in Eastern Promises resulted in his winning the Best Performance by an Actor in a British Independent Film award from the British Independent Film Awards. He also received a Academy Award for Best Actor nomination.

In 2009, Mortensen appeared as himself in the film Reclaiming The Blade where he discussed his passion for the sword and his sword-work in films such as The Lord of the Rings and Alatriste. Mortensen also talks about his work with Bob Anderson, the swordmaster on The Lord of the Rings, Alatriste, Pirates of the Caribbean and many others.

Perceval Press

With part of his earnings from The Lord of the Rings, Mortensen founded the Perceval Press publishing house — named for the knight from the legend of King Arthur — to help other artists by publishing works that might not find a home in more traditional publishing venues.

Perceval Press is also the home of Viggo's many personal artistic projects in the area of fine arts, photography, poetry, song, and literature .

Bibliography

Mortensen is also an author, with various books of poetry, photography, and painting published. His bibliography includes: Ten Last Night — , his first collection of poetry.
Recent Forgeries — , ISBN, 5th Edition, documents Viggo's first solo exhibition and includes a CD with music and spoken-word poetry. Introduction by Dennis Hopper.
Errant Vine — , limited edition booklet of an exhibit at the Robert Mann Gallery.
Hole in the Sun — , color and black & white photographs of a back yard swimming pool.
SignLanguage — , a catalog from an exhibition of his works, combining photographs, paintings, and poetry into a multimedia diary of his time in New Zealand while filming The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Introduction by Kevin Power.
Coincidence of Memory — , ISBN, a book to accompany the joint exhibitions at Massey University and the Wellington City Gallery during the premiere of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.
45301 — , ISBN. Abstract images, fragments, and phrases from poems comprise this photography book. Many of the photographs were shot during travels to Morocco, Cuba, and the northern plains of the United States.
Un hueco en el sol — , a small booklet published to accompany the exhibition "Un hueco en el sol" at the Fototeca de Cuba in Havana. In Spanish.
Miyelo — , ISBN-X), a series of panoramic photographs of a Lakota Ghost Dance. It also tells about the events leading up to the massacre at Wounded Knee.
Nye Falsknerier - . Paintings and poems translated into Danish from Ten Last Night, Recent Forgeries, Coincidence of Memory.
The Horse is Good — , ISBN, a photography book, partly shot during his work on the film Hidalgo, about horses as partners, teachers, and fellow travelers. Images from Morocco, South Dakota, Montana, California, Iceland, New Zealand, Denmark, Brazil, and Argentina. This book reflects Mortensen's fondness for horses. In fact, he bought Uraeus—the horse who played Brego, Aragorn's steed in The Lord of the Rings movies—as well as TJ, one of the horses who played Hidalgo. He also purchased the stallion that played Arwen's horse, a grey Andalusian stallion named Florian, and gave it to the stunt woman, Jane Abbott, who rode the horse in place of Liv Tyler.
Linger - . In this book, the artist combines black and white photographs and prose poems. Images from Spain , Morocco, Iceland, United States, Denmark…
I Forget You For Ever - . Texts and photographs.
Skovbo - . Collection of photographs, poems and quotes. The book is dedicated to Howard Zinn and Dennis Kucinich and functions as a companion to the photo exhibit Skovbo at the Reykjavik Museum of Photography .
Sådanset - . A small booklet published to accompany the exhibition Sådanset at the Palæfløjen in Roskilde .

Visual arts and discography

Mortensen is a painter and photographer. His paintings are frequently abstract and often contain fragments of his poetry in them. His paintings have been featured in galleries worldwide, and the paintings of the artist he portrayed in A Perfect Murder are all his own.

Mortensen experiments with his poetry and music by mixing the two art forms. He has collaborated with guitarist Buckethead on several albums, mostly released on his own label or TDRS Music. Viggo was first introduced to Buckethead's work while working on sounds for an educational CD on Greek mythology. The finished product included a guitar part by Buckethead, which caught Viggo's ear and led him to initiate contact with the guitarist. The collaboration grew from there.

Viggo's discography includes: 1994: Don't Tell Me What to Do
1997: One Less Thing to Worry About
1998: Recent Forgeries
1999: The Other Parade
1999: One Man's Meat
1999: Live at Beyond Baroque
2003: Pandemoniumfromamerica
2004: Live at Beyond Baroque II
2004: Please Tomorrow
2004: This, That, and The Other
2005: Intelligence Failure
2006: 3 Fools 4 April
2007: Time Waits for Everyone
2008: At All

Mortensen is featured on The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King soundtrack, singing "Aragorn's Coronation" , the words by Tolkien and the music composed by Mortensen. In the extended DVD edition of the first Lord of the Rings movie, The Fellowship of the Ring, he sings the song "The Lay of Beren and Lúthien." His poems are written in English, Danish, and Spanish.

Personal life

Mortensen has a son, Henry Blake Mortensen , with ex-wife Exene Cervenka, singer in the punk band X. Henry and Viggo have done public father/son poetry readings together as recently as April 2006. Mortensen is fluent in English, Danish, and Spanish, and conversant in Norwegian. He also speaks French, Italian, Catalan and Swedish reasonably well.

Mortensen is a hockey fan, particularly of the Montréal Canadiens. He wore a Montréal Canadiens t-shirt underneath his armour all through the filming of the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

On December 4th, 2009, wearing a Montréal Canadiens jersey underneath a blazer, Mortensen introduced his idol Guy Lafleur at the Montréal Canadiens 100th Anniversary Ceremony on ice at the Bell Centre.

He is also a fan of soccer and is a fan of Argentine star Diego Maradona, Héctor "Bambino" Veira, and both the Argentine and Danish national teams as well as Argentine club San Lorenzo de Almagro. In 1993, Mortensen went to Ireland during a break in shooting to watch Denmark play in a 1994 FIFA World Cup qualification match. He is also a fan of the New York Mets, and recently appeared in an interview promoting 2009 film "The Road" wearing apparel indicating his support of the Australian Football League's Collingwood Magpies football club.

He endorsed Barack Obama for the presidency. He was also one of the signees of the so called "Toronto Declaration" protesting against spotlighting Tel-Aviv at the TIFF in 2009.

Mortensen has owned property near Sandpoint, Idaho, since the mid-1980s and spends time there when not filming movies.